


pressed between pages

by CrayfishCoffee



Series: pressed between pages [1]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, F/F, Gen, Modern AU, flower shop au, yasha owns a flower shop and meets interesting people the fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-30
Updated: 2018-07-30
Packaged: 2019-06-16 22:48:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15447546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrayfishCoffee/pseuds/CrayfishCoffee
Summary: This time, Yasha is the one who stays in place and the meighty nein are the ones in her orbit.In which flowers are pretty, but aren't the point.





	pressed between pages

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote most of this in one sitting in my bed up till 2 am, and then finished the rest of it the morning after.
> 
> enjoy

Yasha silently sips the coffee from her mug in the blissfully still early hours of the morning.

It’s quite honestly her favorite time of the day, not that she necessarily finds it easy to rise so early. Sleep definitely dulls her eyelids and makes her feel slow. But the cotton soft feeling in the air when most of the world is still asleep, when the sky is barely a baby powder blue before sunrise. That. That is what makes it worth it.

One sugar no cream. It’s what helps her ease into the stillness of it all. Some days she has a sweet rum she substitutes for the sugar to taste, but today is not one of those mornings. She takes another steaming drag before letting the mug clink ever so gently onto the counter. The steam wafts up from the cup and Yasha can’t help but take a deep inhale of it, her eyes falling shut.

She leisurely goes over to the neatly painted wooden sign hanging from the door and flips it over to say open. Then without making a sound, she goes back to lift up her cup, lean back in her chair, and take a big breath of floral air.

Yasha finishes her coffee about the same time the first golden rays of sunlight begin to peak through the glass front of the shop. As she gets up from her stool to put away the cup, the bell above the door rings.

A sweaty woman comes in with blue jogging gear, one earbud pulled out, and looking incredibly pissed. Her heavy breathing is the loudest thing in the shop, since Yasha has yet to put on any ambient music. Her eyebrows are drawn together fiercely over her eyes, scanning the flowers with such steaming ferocity, Yasha can’t be sure she isn’t planning on setting the whole place aflame by sheer force of will alone.

Yasha rests her mug up on one of the shelves behind her. “Can I help you?”

The woman turns her head, apparently having just now noticed her, and her expression loses most of its anger in lieu of a vaguely taken aback expression.

It’s a look Yasha has become accustomed to.

“Looking for anything specific?” Yasha leans one hand on the counter and the woman’s previous aggravated expression returns back to her face with a faint dark blush on her face. She takes out her other earbud and pauses something on her phone, putting on a casual if flippant demeanor.

“Yeah well, apparently I’m sort of due to give an apology to someone I know. Or whatever. Problem is I’m not so great with words ya know? So I was just on my morning jog,” she wipes sweat off her brow with the back of her hand and in the same motion points with her thumb vaguely towards the street over her shoulder, “When I saw this place and thought fuck it. I’ll just get him a stupid flower and be done with it.”

Her eyes go wide and she hurriedly backtracks, “-Well I mean not like, a stupid flower or anything just like. A simple, nice flower. A pretty flower. Yeah.”

“... Ok.” A simple apology flower it is then. “Any preferences for a type or arrangement you’d like?”

The jogger grimaces with a pained shrug. “Not really no.”

Yasha is used to dealing with customers coming in with no clear direction for an order. Luckily she doesn’t really mind having a longer leash with arrangements, and usually hunts down something the client likes fairly easily.

“Hmm. Well, how about you browse about for a little bit, and if you still don’t find anything that catches your eye I can help you pick something out.” Yasha leans back against her stool and begins to fish her phone out of her pocket.

As Yasha finds her shop music playlist and connects her phone to the overhead speakers, she can faintly hear shoes gently pacing around the store behind her. She keeps her back turned in favor of idly scrolling through her phone, even though there aren’t many notifications to check in on this early in the day. She does shoot a text to Molly to hopefully rouse him somewhat so he doesn’t sleep through too much of the day.

“I like these ones.” As Yasha turns around the lady is gently lifting up the petals of a tiger lily in a bundle. “But I don’t think the asshole deserves that much fanfare.”

Yasha makes a general noise of agreement with a slight nod of her head. The woman’s hand strays over to a nearby group of simple daisies.

“I think a couple of these fellas would be fine.”

Three daisies are plucked out of the bin, and put in the simplest wrap tied with plain string per the jogger's request. As Yasha is ringing her up, her hand strays up to idly to card through the loose hair at the nape of her neck, not noticing how the woman opposite the counter watches the movement with rapt attention.

“I uh, I like your earrings. They’re really cool.”

Yasha’s hand pauses over the screen, giving the woman a soft smile. “Thank you.”

She finishes filling out the order when she remembers. Oh. She should probably say something back.

“I like yours as well.”

The customer’s hand goes up to trace the dangling back end of one in her lobe almost on instinct. When she realizes she instead brings it back down where it hesitates in the air for a moment, as if deciding.

Sticking it out to Yasha she says, “The name’s Beau by the way.”

She gives her another soft smile.

“Yasha. Chip?”

 

* * *

 

It’s been absolutely pouring since Yasha arrived early in the morning, and the streets outside are slowly turning into canals.

As such, not many people are out and about today which leaves Yasha with a particularly barren day so far, with not much of a chance of it getting any livier. Luckily for Yasha she doesn’t have much to worry about with the streets looking so ugly outside, with her living upstairs in the second floor above the shop. There’s no awful trek home when her closing shift ends. She does pity everyone else outside having to deal with the bad side effects of the downpour though.

But Yasha doesn’t feel enough pity to ruin her enjoyment of it. 

Tucked up on the display alcove in the front, she leans her back against the side wall and keeps her gaze aimed up at the sky. She waits with bated breath in the space between each streak of lightning, holding onto the afterimage behind her eyelids till they fade. The thunder is absolutely booming, the sound waves making the glass faintly shiver along with her ribcage.

The roar of stormy weather barely edges out morning silence as number one in her heart.

She’s heard of thunder jackets, meant to keep animals, and sometimes people, feeling secure while keep the thunder out. She wishes she could make herself a jacket out of thunder, and surround herself with the feeling of it. 

A dark figure passes in front of her through the glass, made blurry and distorted by the streaming rain, but Yasha pays it no mind and keeps her eyes trained on the rolling clouds. What does surprise her is when the figure actually stops and enters her shop.

He’s a tall, orcish looking man, and he’s completely soaked.

Poor guy doesn’t seem to have an umbrella, and while his long, black collared coat might have otherwise sufficed, nothing can save you from this kind of weather. His short-cut hair is plastered down on his head and is sending concentrated rivulets of water down his face and bunched shoulders. With the signature posture of someone uncomfortably rain-soaked, he takes his hands out from the depths of his pockets and delicately peels the coat off.

The all black suit underneath is just as plastered to his skin.

He turns his head around for a moment, likely looking for some kind of coat rack. Finding none, he carefully drapes it over his arm. Guilt and small tributaries of water drip from his frame.

“Sorry about the uhh . . .” he gestures shamefully at the puddle forming underneath him.

Yasha gives a simple shrug. It’s linoleum. It hardly matters.

“Are you looking for something, or just want some sanctuary from the rain for a bit?”

His shoulders droop low, and gives a weighted sigh that has Yasha suspecting what the predominantly black outfit is for.

“Looking actually. I’m attending a wake in a couple hours, and wanted to maybe bring some sort of arrangement.”

Thunder rolls outside, and Yasha lowers her leg from where she’d tucked it up on the display sill.

“Perfect weather for a wake I suppose.”

She’s met with a morose grin that doesn’t come near his eyes. “I suppose it is.” He drawls.

Yasha doesn’t offer him condolences. He doesn’t look like the type who would benefit from hearing any either. Not that anyone really does.

“Are you wanting something custom, or is a pre-arrangement alright?” She has several different options for this kind of thing.

“A pre-made one is just fine, thank you.”

She lines up several different arrangements and vases on the counter for him to decide amongst. His shoes squish conspicuously as he shuffles towards them. He politely pretends to consider each one, but Yasha is familiar with the look in his eyes. He’s not really looking at the flowers. It’s never about the flowers.

He’s gazing vaguely at a fanning vase of calla lilies, when Yasha decides to lean into the age-old question.

“Who did you lose?”

He doesn’t react immediately, just continuing to not-look the lilies over.

“He was um, a gentleman I worked under for a very long time. Great guy. He was real good people. The type of person who actually deserved more time than he ended up getting.”

Yasha isn’t a stranger to death. She’s probably more comfortable with it than she ought to be. Many customers have ended up teary eyes or god forbid full-on weeping while buying funeral flowers in her shop. She feels for them, she really does, but she isn’t in the business of comfort and has honestly never been very good at it.

It usually just ends up with the person stuck hiccuping head in hands, and Yasha awkwardly trying to shepherd them into paying.

The worst kind of transactions.

Luckily this guy doesn’t seem like he’s about to start crying on her. Yasha gets the impression he hasn’t allowed himself to cry over it at all yet. But his eyes sag with that special kind of fatigue when someone you care for exits your life that way. Someone who is definitely not just someone you worked under for a bit, because no one is as miserable as this man over some regular old boss.

Maybe it’s because he looks so extra pitiful, dripping wet puddles onto her linoleum floor. Maybe the weather just has her in a certain kind of mood.

Yasha sighs.

“What’s your name?”

The man looks up. “Fjord.”

Yasha pushes herself off from the shelf she was leaning on, dropping her arms from where she had them crossed over her chest. “Hold on for just a minute, Fjord.”

She makes her way into a back room behind the counter, just a small space with some extra handy supplies and a coffee maker. She takes down her usual mug, and an extra she keeps around for when a certain purple friend of hers decides to loiter around. Looping her fingers through the handles of both mugs with one hand, she grabs the bottle she keeps next to the coffeemaker with the other and pushes the door open with her back.

Without looking directly at Fjord, she clunks both cups down on the counter and uncaps the bottle. She pours a healthy serving into both, sets the bottle back down, and raises up her mug. Fjord picks up his in turn, and they share a wordless gaze.

It’s the best she can do, but the look of solidarity in Fjord’s eyes makes it worth it.

They down both their servings together, and the gurgling sound from the bottle pouring is masked by the volume of water coming down outside, while lightning flashes from beyond the glass.

 

* * *

 

Her most recent customers are just leaving the store when Beau comes in.

It’s been a good balanced day so far. She’s made some good sales without it being too busy, which puts a satisfied tint to her mood that has her feeling relaxed. Yasha gives her what passes as a friendly grin by Yasha standards when they make eye contact.

“Got another apology to make?”

Beau just snorts and rolls her eyes with a lip curl. “No, thank God.”

“Something else then?”

Beau just purses her mouth, putting her hands in her sleeveless hoodie pouch with a one shoulder shrug.

“Nah, just browsing today." 

She makes a valiant attempt at looking genuinely interested at each and every plant she stops by, and totally indifferent to looking in Yasha’s direction. Lightly touching leaves. Leaning into name labels.

Yasha isn’t an especially perceptive person. 

But Beau isn’t at the moment being especially discrete.

And Yasha isn’t an idiot.

But her friendly mood isn’t enough to get her into a flirting mood, and so she instead picks back up the book she had bookmarked under the counter and slowly flips through the pages. Totally indifferent to looking up in Beau’s direction. Very invested in the story.

“Just how tough are these little fuckers?” Beau points up at a row of shelves lines with a variety of cactuses and succulents. “‘Cause I’ve heard they’re close to goddamn unkillable.”

Yasha hooks a finger into her spot in the book and rests it against the edge of the counter. 

“They’re fairly durable yeah. As close to unkillable as you’re going to get with typical household plants.”

“Even for a gal like me who’s killed every single plant she’s ever been given?” Beau almost brags with a crooked grin.

Yasha looks up, as if considering it for a moment.

“Depends on how dedicated you are to killing ‘em I guess.”

Beau gives a little hmph of acknowledgement, and turns back to the shelf for only a second before she grabs a miniature round cactus off the middle shelf. She saunters over and sets it next to the register. “Well let’s cross our fingers for this little guy then.”

Yasha softly chuckles as she puts her bookmark back in the book and sets it on the opposite side of the register.

“Let’s hope it’s as tough as you look.” Beau idly crosses her elbows on the counter.

Yasha raises a single eyebrow at her.

“Well I mean you’ve got those. . .” Beau gestures a hand at Yasha’s arms and then does a little flex of her own biceps. “Impressive.”

Yasha lifts her upper arms up slightly to give them an appreciative glance. “I know.”

“Like, where do you work out? ‘Cause don’t tell me you just look like that naturally ‘cause that’s bullshit. Or wait, shit, maybe don’t answer that if that was a little creepy.”

She just jerks her head out to the side, motioning to the street.

“There’a a gym around the corner from here that I visit sometimes, although I’d like to think some of this is just a part of my natural physique.”

“Cool cool cool.” Beau says, idly twisting the little cactus pot back and forth with the tips of her fingers.

“Good to know.”

 

* * *

 

Mother’s Day Weekend is finally over, and for the first time in days Yasha feels as if she can really take a moment to breathe.

Yasha isn’t selfish enough to resent good cash flow. Good business is good business. But too many people tend to make her skin prickle, and even with Molly to give her an extra hand around, the nonstop flow of traffic through her shop was starting to make her want to lock her doors business be damned.

The bell above her door was beginning to give her a Pavlovian response that made her want to scream.

Yasha is in the process of refilling the buckets mounted on the wall with a fresh stock of their flowers in the sweet silence of an empty shop, when a bright accented voice calls out from behind her.

“Hello!”

Yasha starts, whipping around to find a cheerful little tiefling woman grinning up at her. Shit. She really must be wiped and out of it since she didn’t even hear the bell when she came in. 

Yasha blinks a couple times, before recovering herself and setting down the flowers she was holding to wipe her hands on her apron.

“Can I help you?”

The tiefling grins even brighter, “You totally, completely can!”

She practically skips over to the counter with an enthusiasm Yasha envies. Tapping her painted nails on the counter for a moment, she places both hands fingers spread on the countertop in an almost bracing motion.

“My name is Jester, and I want to create the biggest, most beautiful, most amazing Mother’s Day bouquet ever in the history of ever!”

Yasha feels a touch confused, considering Mother’s Day had already passed a couple days ago. Wait, it was a couple days ago wasn’t it? Shit. She isn’t sure. She really needs to get more rest after several sleepless nights powering through her arrangement backlog. 

“I know, I know, it’s a little bit late,” Jester pouts as if she could read Yasha’s thoughts, “but I was out of town traveling during Mother’s Day, and apparently the gift I had tried to send to my mom got lost, or didn’t go through, or something and I feel terribly guilty about it.”

She places a hand delicately over her heart, and somehow she manages to make her gestures seem performative and yet genuine at the same time.

“She is really the most amazing woman you know.”

And oh lord, here’s the same kinds of speeches and declarations she’s been forced to be privy to for hours on end. 

“But I won’t make you listen to me gush about her, since I’m sure you’ve heard much too much of that recently.”

Thank the heavens for this beautiful, merciful angel named Jester.

Jester nods sagely at the grateful smile Yasha gives her. “I knew it, I knew it. Now about this arrangement.”

Jester calls for carnations. The prettiest, pinkest carnations they have. She calls for carnations, roses, lavender, asters, peonies, lilies, baby’s breath, and more than Yasha would ever sanely consider putting into a single arrangement. She has to pull down the biggest vase they have to fit everything Jester picks, and even then its an impossibly tight squeeze.

Of course when Jester sees the assortment of decorative ribbons to choose from, why should she have to choose?

The resulting monstrosity is the biggest, busiest, _ugliest_ arrangement Yasha thinks she has ever set eyes on, and believes she will never live down the shame in having a hand in it.

Jester is absolutely _beaming._

“Oh thank you, thank you, thank you! This is absolutely perfect. This is perfect and gorgeous and beautiful she is going to absolutely _love_ it!”

Yasha takes to soaking in Jester’s ecstatic glee instead of the fiend that now sits on her countertop.

The final total after ringing the whole thing up is enough to make even Yasha’s head spin. Well, that might be the sleep deprivation, but objectively this has to be one of the highest numbers that has been assigned to a single arrangement in the entire time she’s been running this shop. 

When she shows the price to Jester, her sunny demeanor isn’t so much as phased.

She pays the entirety upfront, _in full_.

Now Yasha is truly beginning to wonder if this is some sort of sleep deprived hallucination. 

Hallucination or no, Yasha feels obligated to offer help carrying the realistically incredibly heavy mountain of flowers out for her, but Jester cheerfully waves her off. Somehow, she impossibly manages to get her little arms around the entire thing, and carries it off the counter without showing a hint of strain.

She exits the shop with a final little overjoyed thanks lost behind a cacophony of pinks, reds, and yellows. Her heels click neatly as she bounces away with her prize.

When she’s out of sight, Yasha goes to the door and flips the sign over to closed. She goes upstairs, collapses into bed, and takes a nap that lasts several hours, and then several hours more.

Yasha doesn’t notice it herself, until a customer points it out. The next day, she discovers that somehow every single flower label and sign in the store has been utterly, and randomly shuffled around.

 

* * *

 

“It’s not too overplayed is it? I mean, why ruin a classic when it’s a perfectly good one.”

Molly is sitting one leg tucked underneath himself, carefully considering the bucket lined wall full of a wide assortment of flowers, one hand thoughtfully running his chin.

Yasha doesn’t say anything back. At this point they’ve known each other long enough to know that whenever Molly thinks out loud like this, he’s not looking for feedback rather than just wants a soundboard sometimes. His dangling leg bounces rhythmically back against the wooden wall of the counter. His heel connects perfectly in time with the music whether he means to or not, and he barely hums to the tune under his breath. 

He waves vaguely in the air with a roll of his wrist, “Cliche or not, there really is something so perfect about red roses isn’t there? Obviously there’s a reason people for centuries have always favored them. Although, I don’t want to come on _too_ strongly and scare the poor fellow off. You know how much I hate theatrics.” 

He rolls his head onto his shoulder to give her a cheeky grin, and she just rolls her eyes at him without looking up from the seed packets she’s organizing.

“Hmmm what to do what to do…” Molly hums some more to himself while bending over to itch at the skin around his fresh tattoo. It’s only a small one this time: a little butterfly with eyespots on its wings. His newest addition is snuggled up right next to the more elaborate stalk of dendrobium orchids that trail up the side of his entire calf.

Molly had gotten that one at the same time Yasha was getting the black-inked skeletal wings that stretch across her back.

When Beau enters the shop, she says a quick hello to Yasha before her eyes land on Molly, and her face suddenly looks as if she’s just seen some particularly ripe roadkill.

“Well if it isn’t my favorite woman in blue, Beau!” Molly hops off the counter with a shit-eating grin and saunters over arms thrown open wide.

Beau just grunts and sticks her hand in his face to shove him away, which he appropriately rolls with. “Fuck off, Molly.”

“Ah Beau, never change.” Molly pats one hand on his chest. “Speaking of, what’s up with the new shiner? You getting in any trouble?”

The ugly purple cloud around the corner of Beau’s eye looks fresh.

“I didn’t realize that was any of your business. What are you even doing here anyway?” She shoulder checks him out of the way as she makes a beeline for the cactus shelves in the back.

“My dearest friend Yasha here is my part-time employer you might say, if you consider part-time to be her graciously allowing me to bum around her shop while she does most of the heavy lifting.” Molly gets comfortable back on the spot he was sitting on before.

“That so?” Beau leans around some hydrangeas to look questioningly over at Yasha. 

“How’s that cactus treating you? You’re not coming in here to replace it I hope.” Yasha calls out, still carding through seed packets.

Red spreads across her cheeks to mix with the purple, and she quickly turns away to crane her neck up at some of the higher shelves. 

“Nah despite my efforts I can’t get that little sucker to kick the bucket just yet.”

“Since when are you interested in collecting plants?” Molly leans casually back on his arms, his shit-eating grin still going strong.

“Since when are you so interested in swerving into my lane?” Beau bristles.

Molly chuckles again, having far too much fun. “Well let me just say cactuses suit you. Really accents your disposition.”

“So says the biggest prick here.” she mutters under her breath and flips him the bird.

Yasha just shakes her head to herself. She finishes up with the seeds and lifts up the empty box to return it to the backroom. She cuts the box down, leaving it ready to leave for recycling later, and when she re-enters the main body of the shop it’s just Molly. 

“Did she get anything?”

“Nah.” Molly brushes his hand over some of the rose petals, “She looked busy with her phone for a while and once she saw you weren’t coming back out, she left like she was suddenly in a hurry to be somewhere?”

Yasha just rolls her eyes at the mischievous look on his face.

“You mean you annoyed her until she left.” 

“I mean what I mean.” Molly says lightly before one by one plucking three wine red roses from the bin. He considers them in his hand with a kind of concentration she’s seen him direct at his cards, before putting two back. 

“Just one rose will do it I think. It still carries its signature flare without being too ostentatious. And besides, there’s a charm all in its own with a single, red rose.”

He twirls it in his hands for a bit, before looking over his shoulder.

“I think I’ll be taking this and one of those dandy new hanging plants I see you’ve got over there.”

He has at least four other hanging plants at home. He knows what he likes.

Yasha has stopped bothering trying to insist he just take them free of charge. He always finds a way to slip her some money one way or another, and refuses to ever listen to a word edgewise.

 

* * *

 

 

The sky is bleeding yellow on the verge of turning orange when a ginger haired fellow and a small goblin woman enter.

The man gives Yasha a small nod at where she is sweeping some leaf litter into a manageable corner, and she nods mildy back. She can hear them quietly murmuring to each other under the soft music drifting from the speakers and the gently drag of her broom. The man looks tired, and the goblin looks nervous but Yasha doesn’t pay them much mind. 

She’s not much of an eavesdropper most days.

She hears a rough throat clear from behind her.

“Ah, em, excuse me?” 

Yasha finishes a last sweep of the broom before resting the handle against a wall. From behind the counter, she gets a better look at the gentleman and he looks- 

Well. Rough. 

Yasha would believe it if he hadn’t taken a shower in a handful of days, and with the dark clouds under his eyes maybe he hasn’t slept for even longer. His breathing seems stilted at times, and he keeps licking his lips like a nervous tick. 

“Do you have any other, um, smaller arrangements? Perhaps ones that aren’t too pricey, hopefully?” His voice is accented and very low when he speaks. 

“Well,” Yasha points to some single flower arrangements placed in small vases along the far wall, “There’s some like that that are simpler, but the vase costs more. We could also do some sort of custom order and wrap it in paper which will be cheaper.” 

The goblin woman he came in with is perhaps barely as tall as the counter, but Yasha has a good view of her from where she’s idling along the wall looking along the buckets of flowers. Her large ears flick back occasionally at the noise of their conversation, and she has her hands kept in front of her. They seem incapable of being still, fidgeting amongst themselves, running the pads of her fingers over her nails, lacing her fingers together, unlacing them, and starting the whole process over.

She sees them still as the goblin lifts up a couple chrysanthemums as if to inspect them. Yasha doesn’t see where she pockets them, but she does notice that she definitely doesn’t return them to the bin.

He nods. “Yes that will be fine.”

Yasha hums a little noise of acknowledgement. She makes a mental note to add the cost of the flowers his friend pinched to their tab.

“What flowers would you like.”

“I’m not … I’m not quite sure actually.”

“Well, what’s the occasion.” Usually if Yasha knows where the plants are going to end up, she can get a better estimation of how they ought to look.

He doesn’t immediately answer. His gaze seems to be somewhere low beyond Yasha, but his eyes are unfocused and glazed. His jaw is clenched tight as he sucks his lips in, as if biting down hard on the inside of his mouth. She doesn’t notice how hard his hands are trembling until suddenly the goblin woman seems to appear out of nowhere.

She takes his hand into both of hers and squeezes tight.

“Caleb …” Her voice is high and painfully raspy, but the worry and care that bleeds from her tone somehow manages to give it a gentler edge. Her eyes are like yellow saucers in her face that magnifies the fretful expression on her face as she looks up at him. One hand lets go to rub at what back she can reach, and her ears look pitifully drawn low against her head. 

Caleb just nods slightly after a moment, eyes clenched tight. Yasha is terrified for a moment he might start dropping tears on her, but after a couple shakey breathes he seems to gather himself again.

“They are for a grave.”

Ah. So it’s an anniversary then.

Anniversaries are almost worse in Yasha’s opinion. It’s easy to treat a fresh wound. She knows how to do that.

It’s much harder to treat a scar that refuses to stop aching.

Without a word, Yasha slowly moves past her selection of flowers. She passes by the perhaps more traditional white lilies. Too big. Too loud. 

Eventually she picks two white, long-stemmed tulips, along with a touch of caspia for filler. She brings them back to the counter and folds them neatly into some creamy brown paper. Throughout the whole process, Caleb and his friend at the counter are completely silent. The woman never lets go of his hand.

She finished tying it together with a thin, plain black ribbon and places the finished product on the counter. “Here you are.”

The man looks down at it and nods, brows heavy over his eyes.

“Thank you.” the goblin woman rasps, and now her yellow circle eyes are looking up meaningfully at her.

Yasha holds the eye contact for a moment, before giving her own small nod back.

She doesn’t charge them for the chrysanthemums.

 

* * *

 

Yasha breathes in the steam from her cup slowly, taking her time until her lungs reach capacity, and exhales it back out gradually.

By nature of her shop, it’s bursting with mountains of vibrant colors spanning across the entire rainbow. But in the grey morning light, everything seems washed out and pale, as if the flowers are not yet fully awake as Yasha is.

Yasha takes it all in like she does every morning, through dark, half lidded eyes. There’s comfort to the monotony of the moment. There’s security in the feeling of the warm ceramic under her hands and smell of sweet pollen and the kind of fragrance no perfume line will ever get quite right. At the same time, Yasha thinks it might be time for another one of her habitual road trips. 

She loves her flowers, but she also loves the freedom of taking off on her motorcycle, wind ripping through her hair with no destination in mind. Even if she doesn’t see anything of real interest, just the feeling of taking a full day trip, feeling the rumble of the road and scenery pass her by is enough.

As she’s thinking of possible destinations she would conceivably be able to travel to and back in less than 24 hours, there’s a jingle above her door. 

Beau comes in sweaty, panting hard, and is already pulling out her earbuds as she swiftly approaches the counter. Not even bothering making a detour to the cactus section. She quickly winds the cord around her phone and sets it on the counter, eyes on Yasha.

“Ok so,” she huffs, “What is your absolute favorite, best flower arrangement or kind or style or whatever you have here.”

Yasha’s been asked more than once before by customers for recommendations from the store, or what her all time favorite is for any sort of occasion.

But Beau’s piercing blue eyes are cutting through the morning haze with such focus, all the immediate fill-in responses she has stored are suddenly not what she wants to answer with.

“Well … it’s not really anything special really. It’s also not exactly something we sell at the store but, sometimes whenever I’m sweeping I’ll find blossoms that have fallen down that aren’t otherwise damaged. Or, sometimes I keep the damaged ones anyway. I like to take nice flowers I find and put them between the pages of this book I have upstairs. I press them, and they stay there in a little collection I have. I haven’t done anything with them really, but on occasion I’ll flip through and rediscover all the delicate little petals preserved between the pages. So I suppose, if I had to choose for sure, pressed flowers as a whole might be my favorite.”

For some reason Yasha feels herself flush a bit. The only other person who she’s talked to about her pressed flowers is Molly, but they know practically everything about each other nowadays.

Beau stays silent for a moment, still slowing down her breathing.

“Well shit.”

Her face pulls into an expression stuck between a grimace and irritation.

“I was trying to figure out what kind of bouquet I should get you, but I don’t really think you can make one of those with pressed flowers can you?”

It doesn’t take someone like Yasha to know you can’t. 

Something about Beau’s horrible attempt at being anything akin to smooth or collected makes Yasha huff a little laugh.

“No I’m afraid you can’t.” Her amusement bleeds into her voice. “But you can still make an arrangement if you organize them into a floral composition behind glass. Frame them if you’d like.”

Beau smooths over her expression, and juts her chin up. 

“Can I get you one of those then?”

“Hmm. I think I’m happy with the ones in my book already thanks.”

Beau’s eyebrows pinch in pain despite her best efforts to play it off.

“But you can buy me a coffee instead if you’d like.” Yasha raises the mug a couple inches off the counter, and Beau’s fallen expression raises with it.

Puffing up a bit, Beau nods with a vigor that betrays her casual posturing.

“I can do that. I can do that.”

As the golden rays of morning finally come streaming into the glass front of the shop, the flowers inside come alive with color, life, and the silent expectation of a new day.

**Author's Note:**

> the flowers - regina spektor
> 
> [tumblr](http://crayfishcoffee.tumblr.com/) \- [twitter](https://twitter.com/crayfishcoffee)


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